Do you know the ONE setting you should change on your camera to improve focus?
The Kelby Seminar Photoshop for Photographers took place last week in Austin on our one and only snow day of the year. And as you probably know, when it snows in Austin, we get about a 1/2 inch of snow over a layer of thick ice. So driving is scary.
But I braved the weather because I didn’t want to miss this tour. And it rocked! I am so glad I made it.
Matt Kloskowski is is great teacher, and is entertaining to boot. He takes questions between sessions of the seminar, and is very friendly.
And here’s the thing, Elements users – there is very little from this class that can’t be used in Elements too! That part really surprised me. I would guess that 80% or more of the class is applicable to Elements.
The seminar outline is:
- Scott’s Seven-Point System for Camera Raw
- Portrait Retouching (my favorite part)
- Killer Photoshop Tips for Photographers
- Printing Techniques (Actually, this was my favorite part)
- Photoshop Editing Workflow from start to finish
Totally loved the portrait session and learned lots of new ideas. But the printing session – well, I just didn’t expect so many easy-to-implement and understandable tips. I thought it was going to be a bunch of mumbo jumbo about Perceptual and Relative Rendering Intent and other dense subjects like that.
Oh no – here is one of the many tips Matt taught that every one of us can use.
You might remember about a year ago when Drew Hendrix of Red River Paper presented a three part Q&A on Texas Chicks about getting better print quality from your images. One of the most repeated questions for Drew was why photos often come off the printer much darker than they look on screen.
Drew’s tutorial was spot on and Matt K taught all the same stuff. Matt added that most computer monitors today are always going to be brighter than paper because monitors are backlit. Your prints would probably look great if you could always have a bit of light shining through them from the back.
Here is a quick and easy way to solve that. Take a few representative samples of your photos – portrait, outdoor, indoor, landscape, nighttime – whatever it is that you print the most. Flatten the image and duplicate the background layer three times. Change the Blend Mode of each new layer to Screen. Set the opacity of the new layers to 20%, 30% and 40% respectively. Turn off the 30% and 40% layers, and print the file with the 20% Screen duplicate layer on. Then turn off 20%, turn on 30% and print that. And then finish by printing 40%.
Decide which print matches your monitor most closely, and then always add a screen duplicate layer at that opacity to your image before printing. Note that it might be a different opacity for the different types of shots you take – for indoor portraits you might need 30% whereas for outdoor shots you might only need 20%. That’s why you need to try this on a well-sampled range of images. And of course, your images might look better at 18% or 35%, do don’t feel like you have to count by tens.
So do I have you convinced? It’s a great workshop. It cost $79 with my NAPP membership (NAPP is a great source for learning and vendor discounts!).
My only caveat, for those of you who have a brand new copy of Elements that you’ve never used, is that you do need a bit of confidence in Elements before taking the class. Matt goes through all the steps thoroughly, but if you’re still trying to figure out what a layer is 10 minutes after he explains it , you’re going to miss out on some other good stuff. So, I’d say to sign up when you are somewhere between the beginner and moderate experience levels in Elements.
So, my Elements cohorts, don’t feel like you have to miss out on these great trainings. If there is one in your area, take it!
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you for the great tip, I’ll have to try it out!
Cool tip, gonna have to give this a try…don’t know that I’d have thought to do this but if it works it’s gonna make me very happy!! Thanks for sharing.
PatriciaD´s last [type] ..Photoshop Tutorial – Photo in the Heart
That’s the best tip! Thank you so much for sharing! I’m going to try that one my next batch of photos! Yay!
Lula Lola´s last [type] ..Head Games for the Toddler Set
Hey Erin, are you talking about printing from your personal printer, the 1-hour store printers or the pro labs? I can’t stand printing from my personal printer and I guess I’ve gotten used to seeing muddy prints sometimes from the 1-hour printers, but I’m usually (for the most part) pretty happy with the pro lab prints…but that may be because by the time I get them, I’ve forgotten what I was concerned about?!
Thanks for the review…I may have to give the workshop a try.
Good point Tammy – I forgot to mention that. I was talking about my home printer, but the same concept applies at the labs. I actually sent the same pic to print at about 5 labs a couple of weeks ago, and it’s amazing how many of them were dark too.
haha, Tammy – me too! LOL. I had the exact question in my head. Great Tammys think alike!
Tammy´s last [type] ..slideshow photos
Thanks for sharing the printing tip from the class! That is a great idea! I print cards on my inkjet printer at home and am always frustrated with how dark they print out when they looked so perfect on-screen. The explanation makes so much sense!
Love Kelby seminars and training! They’re so down-to-earth.
Down to earth is a perfect way to describe that seminar. Thanks Julie!
Ok So I’m a little confused. When you use a lab to print, where ever that may be. Do you send your photo with the XX% lighter or do you also recommend doing a series of prints with that printing service to determine what works best with that printer, ie not just a fixed percentage lighter no matter what printer used? I do digital scrapbooking and found that my prints are dark at home and also some looked dark from shutterfly. I’d love to find a way to get my prints to look like they do on screen. This is a big step forward.
Alissa, many of the labs will let you run a few test prints for free. If not, printing a few 4x6s or 5x7s is pretty cheap. You might need to print one image without the screen adjustment and one with for each lab until you find one that you like. Because yes, it’s unlikely that you would use the same % at each lab. When I did my tests, the lightest prints came back from MPIX, by the way.
Erin,
Great printing tip. I know how much trouble folks can have printing their digital pics. This will help a lot. Thanks again!
-Mary
ScrappyDigits´s last [type] ..Happy Valentine’s Day!
Just found you, great info. I’m a little new so I have a few questions. Is this being used in lieu of monitor calibration? Also I’ve only found 2 labs (MPIX & HH Color Lab) that will print for me as 95% of my shooting is personal therefore I have not set up a business. What other labs are out there that I could use where I would have many print options, such as die cut cards…………….TIA
Hi Jami, I’m sorry for the delay in responding!
No, this is definitely not in lieu of monitor calibration. You would use it when your prints come out wrong even after calibration. I use Color Inc for a lot of my printing. The have good prices and great quality.
Erin
{ 1 trackback }